Her Majesty Queen Silvia of Sweden

Sweden
,
Class of 2005

Queen Silvia was the Patron of the First World Congress against Commercial Sexual Exploitation of children, held in 1996 in Stockholm.

A startling amount of organizations came together, including law enforcement officials, non-governmental organizations, travel corporations, and other types of officials and workers. The effects of this Congress were far-reaching. The ECPAT Code of Conduct for the Protection of Children from Sexual Exploitation in Travel and Tourism came out of the Congress, and was signed by Swedish travel companies as well as by American travel companies, such as the Carlson Company, run by another TIP Hero Marilyn Carlson Nelson. Also, Queen Silvia founded the World Childhood Foundation in 1999. The other co-founders, corporations, each donated 1 Million US Dollars, to create a fund, which has been used since then to give over 60 Million US Dollars to projects intended to combat child pornography, child trafficking, and any other manifestations of the commercial sexual exploitation of children. The Foundation has always stressed corporate social responsibility. According to its website, the World Childhood Foundation supports over 100 projects around the world designed to combat the exploitation of children. In 2005, Queen Silvia was given a TIP Report Hero Award in recognition of the incredible work her foundation does, and her contributions to anti-trafficking efforts around the world.

In the 2014 TIP Report, Sweden was listed as a Tier 1 country. The government fully complies with the minimum standards to combat human trafficking.

This website was made possible through support provided by the United States Department of State, under the terms of Award No. S-SJTIP-14-CA-1003 The opinions expressed herein are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the United States Department of State.